A/N: If you recognize it, it's not mine. Simple as that.
Chapter 16
Perci POV
It was official, mom loved my Paul. Dinner had gone over ridiculously well, with Paul charming the hell out of my mom without even trying to, and he got along great with her Paul. He had insisted on holding her chair out, and mine, praised her cooking to be on par with Emily's, which I informed her was a huge compliment, and with one bite, completely understood the near-brawl Annabeth, Grover, and I had to get her cookies. He had talked with her Paul about a bunch of random things, and had jokingly told my step-dad that since he had the name first, he'd answer to Paul 2.0. By the end of dinner, my mom had actually told him that he needed to propose, making my friends and I choke, while Charlie just laughed, and Bella sulked for some reason. I figured it was because my boyfriend was 100% family approved, and hers was only liked by Renee.
The past couple days had truly been some of the best since before my 16th birthday, and I had enjoyed every second of them. My mom and Paul had slept in my room, while Annabeth, Grover, and I had camped out in the living room. There had been no monsters attracted by Annabeth's scent combined with my now very slight one, and my friends and boyfriend and his pack got along amazingly. All the excitement had completely abandoned me today, leaving nerves like weights in my stomach though. Today was graduation day, and for the first time, I was panicking about having nothing to wear.
"It's not that bad, Seaweed Brain." Annabeth said, trying to comfort me as I stared at my closet in dismay.
"Not that bad? Wise Girl, I need to wear a dress, and all I have are jeans, shorts, and swimsuit bottoms. I don't even own a skirt! This is the one time I would beg for a cabin 10 makeover." I told her, putting my head in my hands.
"We could always IM Piper, and get her advice. She's always saying you could turn a pair of jeans into a formal outfit with the right top and accessories, so maybe we could get her help with this." She said, making me groan.
"You've seen my closet though. The nicest pair of jeans I own currently have grass stains from when Paul took me on a picnic, and I haven't had the chance to get the stains out yet. I need a miracle here." I said, not even removing my head from my hands.
"'Or the goddess of love and beauty.'" Aphrodite's voice suddenly sounded in my head as two boxes popped into existence at the foot of my bed.
"Let me guess, Lady Aphrodite?" Annabeth asked, as I got up to open the boxes.
"Yep." I said, pulling the lid off the clothing box first, and actually gasping when I pulled out the contents. It was a beautiful Grecian-style dress that was white at the top, but darkened to ocean blue down at the bottom, one shouldered, with subtle wave designs along the hem. Laying it down gently on the bed, I opened the shoe box, awed at the blue gladiator sandals that mercifully, had a low heel.
"Paul is gonna drool when he sees you." Annabeth said, looking at the apparent graduation gift from the love goddess.
"Then let's not delay that, I've gotta get dressed." I said, grinning as I took the dress and ran into the bathroom to change. The dress fit perfectly, hugging my curves gently, and flowing beautifully at the bottom. When I emerged, Annabeth looked stunned, before she smiled at me mischievously.
"Looks like your hair and makeup is taken care of too." She said, confusing me before I caught sight of myself in the mirror I had by my door. My hair was pulled into a half up, half down style with loose curls, and beautifully done makeup with gold eye shadow, and coral pink lipstick. I sighed, before slipping on the sandals, taking a few steps to make sure I wouldn't loose balance and fall.
"You look like a goddess, you know." Annabeth whispered, making me smile sadly.
"Yeah, for the first time, I can see that. I actually look like a sea goddess, don't I?" I asked, looking at the completed outfit in the mirror.
"Yeah, you do. Like you just stepped from the waves, just like Aphrodite." She said, making me smile slightly at the comparison, before shaking my head and grabbing the yellow graduation robe.
"Come on. We can talk about the alarms of me looking like a goddess later, right now, we have the long thought impossible to attend. My high school graduation." I said, drawing a laugh out of her as we walked up the stairs. When we came into view, I saw Charlie, Grover, and both Paul's jaws drop, while my mom teared up.
"What? Did I put the dress on backwards or something?" I joked, knocking them all out of their stupors.
"You look gorgeous, Perci." My Paul whispered in an awed tone, making me blush slightly.
"Geez, Perce, when did you turn into a girl? Has that body been under those jeans and t-shirts all this time, because if so, please visit cabin 10." Grover said, making Annabeth and I laugh.
"Where's Bella, we have to be going soon, don't we?" I asked, glancing at the clock and noticing we had to leave in 5 minutes.
"I think she's finding something to wear, let me check." Charlie said, disappearing up the stairs.
"Seriously, Perce, you look like a goddess. Did you actually become one and not tell us or something?" Grover joked, once he was out of hearing range, though I could sense the serious question behind the joking tone.
"If I did become a goddess, then it's something even I don't know. This is just the work of one, Piper's mom to be exact." I said, drawing a nod of understanding from him, before Charlie came back downstairs.
"She's getting dressed now, she was just having difficulty finding something to wear." He said, making us all nod. A few minutes of waiting in comfortable silence later, Bella came downstairs in a skirt and blue sweater, also carrying her graduation robe. She glared slightly upon seeing me, much to my confusion, though I shrugged it off.
"Am I riding with Charlie, or you and Paul 1.0, mom?" I asked, earning chuckles from everyone at the nickname I had used.
"Paul 2.0, Grover, and Annabeth are riding with us, so you'll have to go with Charlie." She said, still smiling slightly, making me grin excitedly at the answer.
"Sweet, I call back seat! Wise Girl, take a picture to show the Stolls! I bet they'd die laughing at seeing me in the back of a cop car." I called, picking up the hem of my dress and running suprisingly well in heels to the back door of Charlie's cruiser. I ignored the laughter as I opened the door and sat down in the back seat, putting the graduation robe beside me and all but slamming the door shut, before turning to look out the window, pressing my hands to the glass and putting on a fake-worried face. Annabeth was laughing as she snapped the picture, giving me a thumbs up to let me know she got it before getting into my mom and her Paul's rental car as Bella and Charlie climbed into the cruiser.
The drive to the school was spent in somewhat awkward silence, making the nerves in the pit of my stomach worse. Luckily, the drive was short, and soon we were parked, with Charlie letting me out, since the back door could only be opened from the outside. Once I was out of the car, I caught sight of a large group of people, and beamed, gesturing to them once I caught sight of the other part of our little group.
"Hey, I'll let you two talk, I see some of my invites, so I'm gonna go say hi real quick before the ceremony." I said, giving a quick wave to Charlie before walking over to the others.
"Let's go greet the gods, shall we?" I asked, somewhat sarcastically as I lead the way over to the large group. Now that I saw the amount of people who had come to watch me graduate, I was slightly overwhelmed.
"Lords, Ladies." I greeted, nodding to the few gods I respected, such as my father, Hestia, Hades, the Archer Twins, and Hermes.
"Congratulations on your graduation, Persephone, and thank you for inviting us to be here for it." Hera said, making me bite back a scowl, as I still didn't like her for taking my memories.
"It's nothing, thank you all for coming." I said, before quickly introducing my mom and the Pauls to everyone, happily greeting the demigods with hugs.
"I still can't believe you're graduating." Leo said, his tone light and joking, earning a playful scowl from me.
"And I can't believe you're wearing a tool belt to my graduation. Seriously, did Piper and Calypso not knock a bit of sense into you, Repair Boy?" I joked, relishing in the light laughter.
"Seriously though, Perci. Congratulations on graduating." Jason said, giving me a warm smile as he wrapped his arm around Piper's waist.
"Thanks, Superman." I said, before catching sight of my Paul and Thalia out of the corner of my eye and grinning.
"Quick, get the camera! Pinecone Face is threatening my Paul!" I said with a gleeful smile on my face as I pulled out my cellphone to record the hilarity. I noticed Apollo and Hermes do the same, and soon we were all practically dying of laughter at the creative threats against Paul that Thalia was coming up with. Finally, after a few minutes, Thalia seemed to be done with her ranting threats, as she concluded.
"Remember, if you hurt Perci, I will castrate you with a spoon while shoving an arrow so far up your ass, you'll feel it in your brain." She finished, making Paul pale so drastically, he was nearly the same shade as Bella as he nodded frantically. Just then, I heard Ms. Cope calling for graduating students to start getting lined up, making me sigh.
"Gotta go, try not to threaten him again unless you record it, please." I said, giving them all a wave before leaving to go join the other students. I was quickly lined up with the rest of the 'J' students, and soon we were walking into the gym, and taking our seats. The ceremony seemed to drag on forever, the only highlight being Jessica's speech, sadly enough. I just hoped Leo wasn't getting too bored, especially since he had his tool belt with him. Finally, after what felt like an eternity, names started getting called to go get our diplomas, and I smirked as I remembered a request Leo had put in with his confirmation that he'd be here. Fulfilling it as one master of sass to another was the least I could do for making him sit through all the boring parts. After a while, they finally reached the 'J' section, and I didn't have to wait long for my name to be called.
"Persephone Jackson!" The principal called, and I made my way up to the stage, shooting a smirk at Leo, who immediately realized what it meant and dug out a camera with a grin. Once my diploma was pressed into my hand with the generic handshake and congratulations, I held it up and smiled.
"My ticket to freedom!" I called, earning a few laughs, and hearing Leo's cackle of amusement while the principal just shook his head as I walked off stage. It was just a bonus to see Bella shrink into her seat in embarrassment, as it was well known she was my cousin. The rest of the ceremony seemed to fly by after that, and after another, mercifully short, speech, the principal announced us graduated, and I ripped my cap off with the others, throwing it into the air.
I managed to catch it as it came back down, I suspected Jason slowed its descent long enough for me to catch it, and quickly made my way over to my guests. Once I reached them, I was immediately swept up into a huge hug that I recognized as one of Triton's hugs.
"I'm so proud of my baby sister!" He all but shouted, making me laugh.
"Thank you, Triton, but could you let me down please?" I asked, only to be swept up into another hug the second my feet hit the floor.
"Sister's done with school!" Tyson's excited voice exclaimed in my ear, earning a soft smile from me.
"Yeah, I am." I agreed, hugging him back, before being set on my feet once again. I received congratulations from each person, Athena even sounding proud when she gave hers, and Leo cackling about me fulfilling his request as he gave his. One by one, the gods excused themselves after the congratulations were given, heading back to Olympus, with a few of my fellow demigods leaving as well, having things they needed to get back to. I was mildly disappointed, but I knew the life of a demigod was also a busy one with lots of duties. After a few minutes, the remainder of my large group had diminished to just my mom, her Paul, Annabeth, Grover, my Paul, my father, and two brothers, though a few had left gifts as an apology for having to leave early.
"Hey, you good, Perci?" Charlie's voice asked, breaking me out of my thoughts, as I turned to look at him.
"Yeah, I'm good. Just a bit sad that so many of the people I invited had to leave so soon. It would've been nice to spend a bit more time with some of them." I said, leaning into my Paul as he wrapped a comforting arm around my shoulders.
"Well, at least you have the party to look forward to tonight." He said, trying to cheer me up. I gave a smile in response, not really looking forward to the party, as I would much rather celebrate with my family, but knowing Charlie had asked me to go.
"True, very true." I agreed with a nod, before we followed as he lead the way out of the gym. At least I got to spend a bit more time with my father and brothers, so that was definitely a plus. Now I just had to survive a vampire party. I'd been through two wars, this should be easy. I hoped.